Yep. You can have reasonable same results with smaller size. I own both and while both are excellent, the longer one is superior in every aspect. Except that versatility that makes shorter one "bigger" :smile:

I could say that the 75 is more versatile because you don't have to crop as much if you can't get close enough to your subject. For example you see a lot of people suggesting that wide angles are great for landscapes but if what you're interested in is a very distant landscape such as a mountain on the horizon, a telephoto can actually be better than a wide angle.

Any focal length has advantages and disadvantages. A particular lens is a good choice if the advantages offered by its focal length are what you need, and a bad choice if they aren't.

45mm and 75mm are very different focal lengths, very different fields of view. If you have to choose one, choose the one which best delivers the kind of results you want at the distances you want to/have to work at. Neither is inherently "more versatile", each has different areas of versatility.

I have both and use the 45 for both portrait in more restricted areas as well as street work occasionally, the 75 is just such a stunning portrait lens that it is always my first choice if space permits.

I would never consider it an either/or from a purchase point of view unless financial restrictions dictated, they are very different focal lengths with different results/rendering so should not be classed as similar - the build quality does also come into play as does size weight but ultimately it is the end result that count.

I don't have neither of these lens.
But I do have a Olympus M.Zuiko 60mm f/2.8 Macro lens.
Although I love the IQ and bokeh of the pictures of the Oly 75 I've seen, I don't feel tempted to buy the Oly 75 because I consider the FL of the 60mm too close, even a stop less brighter.
But I confess I fell a bit tempted by the versatility of the Oly 45...

Once you have a fast prime instead of a slow zoom, you might well find you use the given focal length a lot more than before.

The only way you can tell if you will like or use a lens is to try it out. (Or gain experience from using similar lenses. But zooms are not similar.)

Click to expand...

Well, maybe if you have a slow zoom. But I don't consider an f/2.8 zoom terribly slow. more important to me is the field of view. I therefore found the zoom lens analysis quite useful as it showed which focal length obviously appealed to me more in terms of the field of view.

Links in this page may be to our affiliates. Sales through affiliate links may benefit this site. We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites.